


Interred

by renwhit



Series: Road to Damascus [5]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Basira does her best, But it packs in a TON of plot/development, Canonical Character Death, Derealization, Elias Bouchard's A+ Management, End!Tim, Flashbacks, Ghost!Tim, Non-Canonical Character Undeath, Severe Dissociation, This one is wicked short for me, brief allusions to suicide, discussions of trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:26:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22881727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renwhit/pseuds/renwhit
Summary: “Oh, I understand you’ve been quite busy. Think nothing of it. Now, how can I help you?”Tim leaned back against the wall by the door, arms crossed. “No pleasantries? I knew prison was supposed to harden people, but I guess I didn’t realize how true it was. Not even a,how are you?"“I rather thought you’d prefer to skip anything that might waste time,” Elias said. “But if you’d like to tell me how you are, by all means.”Or, in which Tim tries a power play, and Elias responds in kind.
Relationships: Background Basira Hussain & Alice "Daisy" Tonner, Background Tim Stoker & Danny Stoker, Basira Hussain & Tim Stoker, Elias Bouchard & Tim Stoker, Mentioned Sasha James & Tim Stoker
Series: Road to Damascus [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1594225
Comments: 83
Kudos: 429
Collections: GerryTitan verse





	Interred

**Author's Note:**

> as you can probably tell from the tags, this one is a hard hitter. i'd say it's probably as painful as concessions, but packed into a much shorter fic so.. good luck!
> 
> content warning for references to less than ideal parenting and homophobia (vague and brief!)
> 
> new arrivals, be sure to read the rest of the series before hopping into this one!
> 
> suggested listening: who are you, really? by mikky ekko

“This is a bad idea.”

“What, so when you want to go there and get some answers, it’s fine, but when I do it’s stupid?”

“Pretty much.” Basira reached through where Tim’s shoes were propped on her desk to take a sip of coffee. There was little emotion on her face, but the soft daisy pattern on her mug took subtlety and punted it directly out the window. “Why do you want to go there now, anyway?”

“Same reason you do. Questions.”

“And they aren’t questions you can ask Jon or Daisy?” 

Tim leaned back in his chair — actually in it, this time, not through the back — and ran a hand through his hair. “Jon said himself that even though he’s an evil bastard, Elias did give him some actual information about being an avatar. I hate him, but he knows more than they do.”

“If you can actually get him to tell you anything, sure.” 

“He’s told you stuff, hasn’t he?”

Basira’s mouth pinched in irritation. “Sometimes. Never really what I want. Nothing straightforward.”

“But enough that you keep going there,” Tim countered as he sat forward again and pulled his feet off the desk. “Yeah, he’ll be his usual manipulative cock of an eldritch middle manager, but I know what I’m getting into. What’s he gonna do, kill me?”

“And you’re not going there to kill him?” Basira asked with her jaw set.

“Yeah, like you’d be heartbroken,” Tim laughed. When she didn’t reply, he relented. “No, I’m not going there to kill him no matter how much I’d like to. Can’t promise I won’t hit him, though. Depends how smug he gets.”

That, it seemed, was enough for her. When he stood, she did as well with mug in hand.

“You coming?” Tim asked.

Basira shook her head. “I should check in on Daisy. She had a rough night, gave herself an impromptu haircut. Cutting it off seemed like it helped, but she still wasn't her most stable, and since you're _not_ killing anyone, I’ve got no reason to detour before going there.”

“Mohawk, right?”

She snorted. “No, just a buzzcut.”

“At least shave some racing stripes into the side next time,” Tim said with a grin as he followed her out the door of the archives. 

“Sure.” There was a beat before Basira continued. “Damn, I wish you could use a phone.”

“Why, so I can text you with periodic, _no, I haven’t dragged Elias to hell yet_ updates?”

“No, so if you do end up hitting him you can take a picture of his face for me.”

Tim’s laugh echoed down the hall. “I’ll be sure to describe it in loving detail.”

Basira nodded with a half-smile, only to go solemn again. “Be careful.”

“I’ll be fine. It’s not like I’ll show up on any of the cameras or anything. Even if someone sees me, they’re not gonna intervene unless they want to get Sectioned.”

“Not what I meant.” 

Tim sighed. “I know. Like I said, not like he can kill me again.”

He left before she could say what they were both thinking:

Some things were worse than death.

* * *

Finding the right cell was as easy as seeing something in a spotlight. It was a beacon to direct attention, to call the viewer’s eyes to whatever the show wanted you to see. Even when there was something more important center stage, that spotlight pulled the eye to whatever waited in the wings.

Elias’s cell shone bright like a floodlight. Falling back onto the familiar discomfort of anger and irritation was a relief. He knew Elias would know he was coming. Elias knew he knew. He knew Elias knew he knew, around and around in a spin cycle of predictability. 

Tim got a front row seat to inevitable cycles these days. Linking that familiarity to the familiarity of anger came as a reflex. 

Part of Tim was tempted to push in on the burn of it and come in the door with knifeclaws and acid and burning pain, but he knew if anything Elias would just find it _funny._ No, he would come in as he was — though, if made sure he radiated death more strongly with each step he took, that was nobody’s business but his and the End’s. 

He knew it was working when each cell he passed went silent. There was a strange rush that came with having that effect on others, and one he knew would be easy to chase. He could walk through whole crowds like this, and know each person would leave never able to forget how assured their own death was. They would understand how the moment they died would be no different from that exact one they lived in. They would see that because everything — their lives, time, reality itself — would end, it was ending right then, and had already ended.

_Don’t lose yourself to your instincts,_ Daisy had said. _Don’t forget why you’re there._

Tim took a moment to reorient himself. That urge wasn’t him. It couldn’t be. That was the End, and the fact that he recognized it as _not him_ meant he still was _him._ He was still Tim Stoker, and he wouldn’t stop being Tim Stoker, avatar or no. 

He was still Tim Stoker, and that was why he came here. 

The cell he stepped into looked more like his university dorm room than any prison. There was the same small bed, thin mattress and all, a desk, a bookshelf with a dozen volumes on it, and a dresser tucked next to the door. Tim knew if he opened any drawers, he’d no doubt find all of Elias’s clothes folded with military precision, because not even prison would stop Elias from being insufferable. 

The man himself sat at the desk. No doubt it had at one point faced the wall, but in his time here Elias turned it around so the chair faced the door and placed the desk between him and whoever came inside.

Just another office. Home away from home. Prick. 

Elias looked up from the book he was reading. No orange jumpsuit, but none of the pressed suits he used to wear around the Institute either. The plain button-down must be as close as he ever got to casualwear. 

“Ah, Mr. Stoker,” he greeted. “I was wondering when you would come visit.”

Tim dropped the invisibility he’d kept while walking through the prison. It came as no surprise that Elias saw right through it, and he refused to let that throw him off. 

“Sorry to make you wait,” Tim replied, as flatly as he was able. 

Elias tucked a bookmark into the pages he was reading and set his book aside: _The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia,_ with art by Robert Smirke — a book Tim had read himself for that very reason. Hilarious.

He tried to keep any sign he recognized it off his face, but the fact that he had to think about doing so at all gave him away as much as a shift in expression would. He’d never had a great poker face, anyway. It didn’t matter when up against someone of the Eye.

“Oh, I understand you’ve been quite busy. Think nothing of it. Now, how can I help you?”

Tim leaned back against the wall by the door, arms crossed. “No pleasantries? I knew prison was supposed to harden people, but I guess I didn’t realize how true it was. Not even a ‘how are you?’”

“I rather thought you’d prefer to skip anything that might waste time,” Elias said. “But if you’d like to tell me how you are, by all means.”

Ugh. “Peachy. How’s jail treating you?”

Elias smiled. Tim wondered if he ever got tired of being smug. “Dull, most days, which is why I’m always glad to see old friends. Most visits happen on the record, though, so the novelty here is refreshing.”

“Delighted to help.”

“Let’s not lie to each other, Tim. You wanted to ask me something?”

Tim didn’t reply for a moment. There was something there, something with Elias that felt… wrong. Wrong in a way he didn’t know how to quantify. It wasn’t Tim’s own hatred for the man, nor was it the unsettling discomfort Tim harbored before he knew anything beyond “person in power with a weird interest in my friend”. No, this was beyond that. Something deeper. 

“It really is a shame that you left us when you did.” Elias said, apropos of nothing. “You would have been quite useful.”

Train of thought derailed, Tim’s brow furrowed. “The hell is that supposed to mean?”

“The eye color is wrong, but it’s nothing I haven’t dealt with before. All the same, it no longer matters much, does it?”

_“What_ are you talking about?” He didn’t have any hope for answers there. For all he knew, Elias was just spouting cryptic shit to sound like he was even more of a creepy demon man than usual in an attempt to mess with his head. 

“Nothing of importance.” Christ. Maybe hitting Elias would come earlier than Tim had expected, not that he was trying to hold off. “You have questions, then?”

“Why did this happen?”

“Why did what happen? My arrest? Your visit? You’ll have to be more specific.”

Tim didn’t think his glare could get heavier, but that didn’t stop him from trying. “All of this. Me being an avatar. I died, and then I came back. Why?”

“You’d know the answer to that better than I would,” Elias replied as he folded his hands on his desk. “Every avatar makes their choice for their own reasons, even if you don’t remember _making_ that choice.”

“What, you don’t have a ballpark guess? Mr. All-Knowing, and you fold at one question,” Tim scoffed.

“As I’ve said before, I’m not all-knowing. I know what I wish to, and your reasons for joining the End’s retinue were never high on my list of priorities.” There was clear amusement in Elias’s voice. “Perhaps whatever was on the other side was unpleasant enough you’d take on this mantle if it meant escape. Perhaps you made a bargain for something else. Perhaps you simply didn’t wish to leave our world so young.”

Faint sarcasm in the last possibility slipped between his words like poison. Tim’s eyes narrowed, and with the way Elias smiled it was clear he didn’t miss that he got a reaction. 

“And there’s not exactly a formal resignation process, right?”

“Honestly, I can’t say I’ve looked.” Elias’s eyes were equal parts pleasant and ice cold. “For anyone else, I would say resignation from the post would come only through a more permanent end, but that isn’t much of an option for you, is it? If you have any luck, do let me know. I’m quite curious.”

“I’ll be sure to write you a detailed statement. Care to take a guess what it’ll say? Two words, ends in _off.”_

“Mm. Well, a man can dream. With that out of the way, let’s move on to why you actually came here.”

“I came here for answers,” Tim retorted.

Elias gave him an indulgent smile. “Tim, we agreed to not lie to each other.”

It wasn’t a lie. Not really. Sure, he had other things in the back of his mind, but that didn’t mean coming for answers was a _lie._

“...I’ve been thinking,” Tim said at last.

“Oh? What about?”

“That dead man's switch threat, from back when Daisy was going to shoot you.”

With what looked like genuine intrigue, Elias said, “And what conclusion have you come to?”

“I’m new at all this, yeah. I’ve only been an avatar a few months compared to your— your _however_ long you’ve been in this shit.” Tim watched closely for a trace of any emotion, but Elias wore a solid mask. “But between you and me, only one of us is connected to death. You might Know how it works on some level, but like you said: you’re not all-knowing. You’re not able to use your spooky magic eyes to see into the End.

“Me? I’m _death,_ and I don’t think that killing you would be as lethal to the others as you say. Might not be pleasant, but something tells me getting rid of you would be worth it.”

Elias leaned back in his chair, thoughtful. “An interesting point, and not one I’m surprised to hear you make. Reckless. Violent. In death as you were in life.”

Lip curled to bare teeth, Tim pushed off the wall. “And there’s nothing you or any of the guards here could do to stop me.”

“The guards, no. They wouldn’t be able to stop a specter from tearing out my very soul.” He sounded rather unfazed for a man who just admitted to being defenseless. “Of course, you haven’t let yourself think about what may happen if you’re wrong.” 

Tim’s snarl turned to a sharp grin. “Didn’t say I’d do it today, but someday I bet I’ll be strong enough to keep them alive even if you aren’t lying. I’m not like Oliver, just seeing _how_ people die. I watch last moments, and I can stop them. If anyone could kill you and keep them alive, it’d be me.”

“I wonder,” Elias replied. “Do you ever tire of being selfish?”

“Sorry?”

“Do you feel like you _finally_ have some control when you decide who lives and who dies? Does it make up for all those you let die when you were alive?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Elias made a small noise of satisfaction, but Tim could barely hear it around the anger and static rushing in his ears. 

“As I mentioned, the prison guards would not stop you if you attacked me. I, however, will defend myself should you push me to it.” There was no humor in Elias’s voice anymore, leaving something calm and far too level. 

Tim leaned back onto the wall. “Sure. What are you gonna do, kill me?”

“Oh, Tim.” The humor was back, barbed and targeted. “Even if I were able, I’ve never been one for wish fulfillment.”

Tim let those barbed-wire words drag across his skin, and spat a short, bitter laugh like blood. 

“Right. Sure.” He shook his head. “I told you I’d see you in hell. Pack a bag. I’ll be back to give you an escort.”

Elias’s voice stopped him before he could leave in full. “Tim, are you under the impression I’m afraid of you?”

“Me? No.” He turned back to face the desk and let the End hang around his shoulders and run between his teeth. Copper blood and acrid fear made for a heady blend, one that he savored. “But I know damn well you’re _terrified_ of death.”

Elias cocked his head, regarding him like one might a pet that performed a trick it hadn’t been taught. Tim wasn’t fooled. All the composure in the world couldn’t hide the fear that shaped Tim’s being.

“I’m only a man, and anything with life fears losing it.” Elias raised a brow. “Or, almost anything. I’m sure you’re well-acquainted with that fear by now, even if it’s not one you shared in before your own death.”

“That isn’t—”

“How many deaths have you witnessed at this point? You woke late February, from then to mid-May… Eighteen? And a mere six more that you successfully intervened in.”

Spot on. If Tim had breath, it would be coming faster. As it was, his hands curled into fists at his sides. “You—”

“I’m sure you did your best, but that isn’t a comfort, is it? To you or to the eighteen dearly departed.” Still Elias spoke casually, as if this were nothing but another meeting between boss and employee. “But you can’t deny that the deaths bring a certain… satisfaction.”

Tim stepped forward, red-hot fury building in his chest. “You shut the _hell_ up, that isn’t how it _works—_ ”

“Isn’t it?” Elias’s eyes were icy enough to rival the not-void hell that lingered on the edges of Tim’s memories. “You can’t tell me you _mourn_ them, not when you never knew them in the first place.”

He did mourn them, he did, he did. But was it _them_ he mourned or was it that he was made to carry their last breaths? Did he grieve because a sudden death deserved it in its own right, or did he grieve because he felt that he had to pay for the sustenance it gave him? Was he only bartering his sorrow for their terror? 

It was then he realized he didn’t know the answer. He didn’t know if he _wanted_ the answer.

Elias had never concerned himself with what knowledge people wanted.

“Did you mourn, say, him?”

Memories. A break-in, an intruder with a gun. Tim didn’t manifest fast enough to knock it away, and the homeowner bled out on the floor before anything else could be done. Doug Major, age 48. Tim stumbled to the side and braced his arm against the wall as his chest exploded in pain like the bullet had hit him instead. Red filled his vision. Blood? Pain? Anger? Along with it came a newfound steadiness to his hands. 

No. No, this wasn’t—

“Or her?”

Empty beach. Late-night swimming. No one to call for help. Nothing to grab for her to hold onto as he pulled her back to shore. Valerie Hughs, age 35. He didn’t realize how long it took to drown. He choked on saltwater and sick _fullness._

“Either of them? At least they had each other, though I suppose that’s no comfort.”

Knife slashes opened on his skin, enough for two. Katie Pitt. 58. Evan Pitt. 62. Their only crime: the wrong place, the wrong time, the poisonous joy from one who had learned to savor the taste of death. Their injuries were deep enough he knew he wouldn’t be able to get help in time — right? Or did he just let them die? Did he want them to die, somewhere inside? A hollow place inside him filled, the tremors in his hands went still, and dry heaving wracked his entire body as he sank to the ground. 

“You made a good effort for her, but it wasn’t enough. Nothing you said worked.”

Ropeburn on his throat. Snap of his head to the side. Eli Connor. 29. His violent shaking afterward had nothing to do with _hunger_ deep inside him, not when that hunger was sated. His face was wet. Blood? Tears? Both?

“And the _lives_ they left behind, Tim, the _people_. Have you thought about anything besides your own guilt?”

_“Stop—”_

Doug Major, holding a newborn granddaughter. The same granddaughter dressed in solemn black, with no understanding of why she was at this place or how much the man in the casket had adored her. 

Valerie Hughs, walking through a bridal boutique with anxious excitement. A sobbing man tearing a white dress from its hanger and ripping it apart before crumpling to the ground and clutching the fragments to his chest. 

“Have you even _considered_ the suffering of the others who cared about those whose lives you took?”

Katie and Evan Pitt, dressed in matching formalwear and matching expressions of pride. A young man seated at a piano onstage, glancing at two empty chairs in the front row and wondering what could have made his parents so late. 

Eli Connor, sitting on a couch by a woman who looked just like her. The same woman freezing in a bedroom doorway with a scream so raw he felt it in his own throat.

Was it him that screamed? The awful ringing in his ears drowned out all else, it was impossible to tell. All he could hear was that same calm, smooth voice. 

“And now you threaten the same thing without a care for the collateral of your recklessness. You claim you have no choice, you claim it’s for a good cause, but you’ve only considered your own pain. You put up enough of a fight that you’re able to continue lying to yourself, but you and I both know what you really seek — deaths that will fill the empty places inside you.”

_“Please—”_

“Eighteen deaths on your hands. I didn’t show you them all, but know this.” The calm was gone, replaced with harshness that tore like a serrated knife. “I can make you relive _every one_ of those deaths if I choose. I can remind you of how much each _suffered_ and how much their suffering _fed you_.”

Awful, ringing silence, cracked through with Tim’s sobs. Even the thought of trying to collect himself was laughable. It was another long moment of shaking and heaving despite the _nothing_ in his stomach that he realized he was muttering apologies around chokes.

“None of the dead can hear you, Mr. Stoker. You’ve made quite sure of that.”

There was no way to know how long it was before Tim went quiet, staring a hole in the floor between his still-trembling hands. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t. He couldn’t do this, he couldn’t take another second of it.

When Elias gave him a sickly, “It’s alright, take your time,” Tim remembered just how good a motivator anger was. 

He stood, hand braced on the wall for support. Nothing around him looked real and when he spoke it sounded like a voice not his own, but the quiet ember of absolute hatred between his teeth kept the words steady.

“Eighteen people. Some died quietly. Some died naturally. You’ll run out of weapons.”

Elias tilted his head. When had he moved from the desk? When had he rounded it to stare down at Tim? “You know you aren’t powerful enough to try anything right now. If you return here, you’ll bring that many more witnessed deaths with you. I really don’t think I will.”

“If I don’t witness any more—”

“Tim, you and I both know you aren’t strong enough for that.”

Tim didn’t have it in him to argue. He supposed that just proved Elias’s point. The hatred moved to burn in his throat like acid and he no longer knew who it was towards. 

“I’ve read enough statements to know that when you’re an— an _avatar,_ you get numb eventually. Then you’ll have nothing.”

“Oh, does Jon seem numb these days?”

Knifeclaws, acid, burning. “You stay _the fuck away from_ —”

“I’ll take that as a no, then. Besides, even if that did somehow happen, you’re forgetting something quite obvious; a much sharper weapon than anything I’ve shown you.”

Though Tim didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of asking, not knowing was worse. The calliope he’d been able to shove down so far grew to a crescendo, laced with the last words and cries of those whose death tied itself to his being. 

“What…” His mouth tasted of copper and regret. “What are you talking about?”

Elias smiled.

“I can’t imagine you’ll ever be numb to seeing how long it took for Danny Stoker to die.”

The world went white. He couldn’t feel his own body. Someone was shouting. There was an arm braced across Elias’s chest, fist knotted in his shirt and pinning him to the wall. The scars across it meant it must be his own, but he couldn’t feel a thing. He’d never been able to manifest that much of his body at one time, he thought with some faint interest. His throat was on fire. Was it _him_ shouting?

_“—I’ll kill you, I swear to Christ I’ll kill you—”_

It sounded like his voice. Kind of. His voice, but with more rage and anguish than he could ever remember feeling. It couldn’t be him, then. It couldn’t be his brother that Elias had just mentioned. No. No, they were both dead. 

Where was Danny? Tim was supposed to keep him safe.

Through the static cloud in his head he saw Elias’s eyes glint, and everything around him became far too real once again. There would be no escape into numbness. 

He staggered backward, the calliope deafening at this point and only just managing to overpower screams. Fiery pain ripped across his chest and down his arm as the injuries that killed him tore open, the ones that he damn well asked for and the ones that brought no release with their agony. 

“ _Leave._ Leave and do _not_ come back.”

And Tim fled.

* * *

Quiet. Safe? No, no. 

“...morning after Westly’s departure, Buttercup thought she was entitled to…”

That voice. Safe. Yes. 

“...love of her life had fled, life had no meaning, how could you face the future, et cetera…”

Where was he? Familiar, not safe. But safe people were here. 

“...two seconds of that she realized that Westly was out in the world now, getting nearer and nearer to London, and…”

London. Yes, London. The Institute. Right. A small room. An office?

“...worked his jobs and built his farm and…”

An office. Whose? Why did he come here?

“...the moping has destroyed your eyes, the self-pity has taken your skin; you’re a…”

That was why. This voice. Safe. Grounding. Yes. 

“Buttercup ran to her bedroom mirror. ‘Oh Westly,’ she…”

_The Princess Bride._ William Goldman. A woman’s voice reading. Steady. He listened.

“...her parents were squabbling. (Sixteen to thirteen, and not past breakfast yet.)”

That used to make him laugh. He started the same tally with his own parents. Funny to depressing real fast.

“...do something with your hair while you’re at it,’ her mother…”

His head canted by a degree to one side, then the other. He must be sitting against the wall. Legs folded haphazardly. Tucked against his left side was a towel. Black. He could just make out a darker patch across it.

“...easy being tidy.’ Undaunted, she set to work.”

Work. His work. Something was wrong. Something happened. Something bad. Very, very bad. Him? 

No. No, he couldn’t think about it. Not right now. Right now was for listening.

“...chores finished immediately. There was much to be done now, with…”

Much to be done. There was something he was going to do, something that had to be done. He was going to do it. Why didn’t he? 

Listen.

“...there was no time for self-improvement until well into the afternoon.”

He lifted his head. It was like lifting the weight of the sky, but he’d done that before. He’d done that before and he would do it again. 

He was so tired.

“...Tim? You back with me?”

Tim. Yes, that was his name. Why did that feel like a surprise? Why did he feel like he should be called something different? What was he expecting?

It was right there. If he just _concentrated_ , he could figure it out. He could. 

“...a good, cold bath. Then, while her hair was drying, she would…”

Gone. That didn’t matter. Whatever it was, it wasn’t him. He was Tim. Yes.

The room came into a bit more focus. Still hazy, still unreal, but there. 

His head ached. Phantom pain latticed across his entire body.

Phantom. Ha.

“...hair was the color of autumn, and it had never been cut, so…”

Haircuts. His mom used to yell at him about that. Said it was bad enough her son wore nail polish and kissed boys, but long hair? Too much. Tim wouldn’t have cared what she thought either way, but someone asked him to grow his hair out alongside her. She wasn’t out yet. Said that if a guy as well-liked as him had long hair too, people wouldn’t think anything of hers even if they still thought she was a guy. 

Sasha. Yes. Sasha. Short brown curls. No. Long and blonde. Long and blonde and freckled and Sasha.

“...very quickly now, her potential began to be realized.”

Slowly, slowly, his head turned towards the desk. There the woman reading sat, though she paused when she saw him looking at her. The detective? Basira. Basira.

“Tim?”

He couldn’t speak. Did he have a mouth? 

“Do you want me to keep reading?”

No answer. That was answer enough.

“From twentieth, she jumped within two weeks to fifteenth…”

By the time Basira finished the chapter, Tim felt real enough to feel embarrassed. How long had he been sitting here, staring into nothing? Long enough his own injuries flickered in and out like they had when he tried to see into the Buried if the towel beneath his left arm was anything to judge by.

“How… how long was I gone?” His voice sounded like sandpaper. 

“Gone from the Institute or gone… gone?”

“Either. Both.”

Basira set the book aside. “Four days. You walk everywhere, so I wasn’t worried. Then when I came in this morning, you were in here. The bloody look, so I grabbed a towel and tried to talk to you like I did before. It didn’t seem like you could hear me, or… knew I was there, so I backed off for a bit. After a while though, it didn’t look like anything had changed, so I thought reading aloud would help.”

Mouth tight, Tim nodded. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“Yeah.”

The following silence was dense, but Tim didn’t have the energy for tension. 

“If you want to say _I told you so_ —”

“Stop saying that.”

He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “What?”

“I’m not going to say _I told you so_ no matter how many times you tell me to. It doesn’t help anything.”

Propping up one knee to rest his elbow on it, Tim’s head dropped forward with a choked laugh. “Used to tell my brother the same thing. You’d think I’d know better.”

Basira didn’t say anything to that. Fair. There wasn’t much that _could_ be said. 

“Do you want to talk about what he showed you?”

“That obvious?”

“Uh, you went to confront a guy who psychically tortures people for kicks and came back a dissociating wreck. Pretty obvious that he showed you something.” 

“Right. Stupid question.”

“Kind of.”

Silence. It was clear she was waiting for him to explain, but he just… couldn’t. Not now. Not yet.

“Do you want me to— to read more?”

Basira’s question was genuine despite its falters. Tim’s nod, the same; faltered and true.

“Right. ...Prince Humperdink was shaped like a barrel. His chest was a great barrel chest, his…”

* * *

“‘I’ll never love you.’ ‘I wouldn’t want it if I had it.’ ‘Then by all means let us marry.’”

Basira’s eyes flicked up as she finished the chapter, the same nonverbal check-in she made after the minuscule chapter between this and the one that grounded him in the first place. 

He nodded. He still felt like absolute shit, but that wasn’t going anywhen any time soon. Waiting to feel ready for this conversation would be akin to waiting for the heat death of the universe.

_Don’t keep too many secrets,_ Daisy had told him.

_I’ve got nothing to hide,_ he had told her. He didn’t intend to begin now.

“I asked Elias why I was an avatar.” An abrupt start, not that it mattered. “He said he didn’t know. I asked him how to stop being one, said he didn’t know.”

“Just flat out like that?”

Tim snorted. “Hardly. Add a bunch of cryptic bullshit and that stupid smug face he gets.” 

“Ugh.”

“Then I, uh… I told him I was pretty sure I could kill him and keep you all from dying.”

There was a pause. “So when you said you weren’t going there to kill him—”

“I wasn’t going to _then,”_ Tim cut in. “But I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t be as immediately lethal as he claimed. That, plus my ties to the End… Give it enough time so I’ve got a better handle on all this, maybe, and I could do it. He acted all nonchalant, so I told him I was well aware that he’s scared of death. Then he…”

When he trailed off, Basira moved from her chair and sat on the floor across from him. “Still with it?”

“Mm.”

“What did he say?”

“He said I must be really familiar with that fear. Spelled out the number of deaths I’ve witnessed.” 

Tim wanted to stop there, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t, not when he’d asked Basira back when he was first learning what his role as avatar meant to help him stay on the level. She needed to know what things he’d done to do so. She needed to know what he was in full. 

“Five deaths. That’s how many he pulled out in specific. The person. How they died. The people they left behind.” He didn’t have the words to describe how it felt. These were simple. Impersonal. Watching them all over again was so viscerally personal it tore wounds across his skin and sent him crumpling to his knees. “And… and how watching them—”

His hands shook. That was bad. Very bad. Tremors meant hunger meant death.

“Tim.” Whatever well of patience Basira drew from, it seemed infinite. He wondered how exhausted she must be, serving as a rock for the non-humans falling apart around her. “You’re still here in the office. You’re with me.”

“Right. Right, sorry.” He scrubbed a hand over his face as if motion would force away how unsteady it was. “He made sure to include just how much their deaths… sustained me. Kept me here.”

“Jesus.”

He winced. “Thought I got why you were so against my new diet before, but if you’re wondering, I _really_ get it now. Not that it changes anything. I’m still—”

“That isn’t why I don’t like it.”

Tim looked up at her, brows drawn. “What?”

“I just—” Basira pursed her lips with what almost looked like frustration. “It was never that it’s what you live on now. Or, not _live._ Whatever.” She gestured broadly to him. _“This_ is why. It messes you up. You were a mess after the first one and I knew it was just going to get worse. The people you’re pulled to are going to die, yeah. That doesn’t cure guilt. It’s just guilt until it cauterizes and you go numb.”

_Oh, does Jon seem numb these days?_

Push that down. He just barely managed to get his bearings after who knew how long; he couldn’t afford to lose it again. 

“So he took you on the world’s worst guilt trip, then,” Basira said when he didn’t reply.

“That wasn’t all he used.”

It was difficult to tell with her, but Tim thought she was surprised. “It wasn’t?"

“He said he’d… he’d show me how long it took for Danny to die,” he croaked. “And like Jon said — you don’t need skin to sing, so h-he might have—” Each word grew more air than speech until Tim’s voice gave out in full. 

“That’s… a lot.”

Tim jerked his head up to stare at her. “Uh, yeah, I’d say so.”

“No, I mean—” Basira took a moment to collect her thoughts. “It’s fucked up, of course it is, but that’s also _way_ more than he’s ever used on a person in one go.”

“How do you mean?”

“Like, with Melanie — he just told her _how_ her dad died. He didn’t show her any of it. Threatened to, yeah, and it was awful for her, but he only needed a little to get his point across. M’not really sure what he used with Martin, something about his mom, but it wasn’t so much so that he couldn’t pull himself together enough to finish the plan.”

Tim was sure she wasn’t saying that it was just about Tim not being able to pull himself together with the same efficiency, but beyond that he didn’t follow.

“I reckon he thinks you might be right. He thinks you might be able to do it, and he wants you scared.”

One would think that a revelation like _‘you successfully threatened the guy you hate most in the world to the point he had to retaliate because he didn’t want you to get the first move’_ would come with more satisfaction. Instead Tim just felt cold. Cold and so, so tired.

“...Huh.”

Basira studied his face. “Are you going to go back?”

“Am I—?” An incredulous, false laugh finished the thought. “No, Basira, I’m not. I can’t die, but watching Danny get tor—” He couldn’t. No. That white empty void pressed on the back of his eyes at the thought with a whisper of calliope far, far away. “I think that’d kill me.” 

He slumped back against the wall and tried to ignore the familiar burn around his torso and down his arm. The wounds hadn’t opened in full yet, and he didn’t want to push it. With any luck, Basira didn’t see how tight his jaw went at the pain.

Static void lingered in his head, inviting him to fall back into numbness for a while. It’d be easy. He could go and walk and not feel so fucking miserable for a minute. 

A minute would turn into an hour would turn into who knew how long. He couldn’t. He needed to stay present, right? Wasn’t that important? 

See, Jeff? Tim _did_ retain some of that therapy. Ha. King of coping.

Basira looked him over. “Do you… want me to read?” 

What the hell. It was as good a grounding exercise as any, and it seemed like it’d locked in Basira’s head as Solution X to Problem Y. Damn good book, too.

“Might as well. Next chapter is when Dread Pirate Roberts shows up, yeah?”

“Spoilers.”

“...This book came out in 197-fucking-3.”

“Shut up.”

* * *

“But blackest of all were his flashing eyes. Flashing and cruel and deadly…”

There was a longer pause than Basira normally left between passages. Tim opened his eyes to look over at her, confused.

“Forgot to say something before you went but, Jon doesn’t know I see Elias for intel. You won’t tell him?”

Tim took her tentative, unsaid request for a confidant with his usual grace.

“Basira, I’ll take it to the grave.”

When the thick paperback came sailing right for his head, he only just managed to manifest quick enough and catch it around his still-broken laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> "ren what was elias talking about re: eye color and tim being useful and shit??" [read this post and lose it with me](https://equalseleventhirds.tumblr.com/post/189335572013/since-everyone-draws-elias-hot-i-have-decided)
> 
> post MAG162 edit: can you guys believe tim liking the princess bride is fucking canon now. like. a month and a half after i wrote this. dear g-d. 
> 
> coming soon: tim visits family, and catches up with a friend
> 
> catch me at [@titanfalling](https://titanfalling.tumblr.com/) on tumblr!


End file.
